


Eidolon

by Fluidfyre



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Dalish, F/M, Fish out of Water, Humour, Hunters & Hunting, Magic, Religion, Romance, Sexual Content, Sexual Tension, The Fade
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-21
Updated: 2015-03-27
Packaged: 2018-03-08 11:35:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3207722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fluidfyre/pseuds/Fluidfyre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Out of anyone, Taliah Lavellan was the most surprised to awaken and find herself a new icon of the human Chantry.  Having struggled with her own faith for years, finding herself the cornerstone of another is not without its challenges. Nevermind the hole in the sky.  Or the curious hahren who seems to know more than he lets on. A fast ally in a foreign world, this is their dance, their dream, and their downfall.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Breach

            “No, now Varric! I have waited long enough, as has her Most Holy.”

            “I take what few freedoms I can, Seeker.”

            Cassandra huffed and held the door of the dwarf’s room, waiting for him to pass through. In short time they neared the gates of Haven, when up the mountain the Temple of Sacred Ashes exploded. Heads of the faithful downslope snapped to where the green smoke and fire erupted, the keening screech as the Veil tore echoing across the slopes. In the wake of the sound came the blast, knocking Varric off his feet and flattening Cassandra on her back.

            She was up before the rest, and Varric cursed where he lay on his ass, struggling to breath. In the sky above the temple was a breach that could have swallowed the town, through which the warped light of the Fade shone. It sucked at stone and ash that hung in the sky, pulling the clouds from their peaceful meander to whirl together and drain out of the heavens.

            “Justinia…” Cassandra took off running. She sprinted past templars, chantry sisters, and soldiers struggling to regain their senses. “With me! We must find the Divine!”

            Varric’s legs kept him at the back of the pack.

            On the peak, soldiers rallied through fire and ash, the air tingling in the glowing ruins. The Veil sundered before their eyes, another breach, but in this there was light. They could not look away from the golden glow, eyes watering in the brightness as the tear destabilized. Taliah Lavellan was left stumbling in its wake, a jagged, glowing mark upon her left hand. The tear burst closed with a clap, and she collapsed on the blackened rock.

            It was a frantic claw up the slopes, voices raised in panic and fear. Some said the temple was gone. Some said it levelled. And some merely prayed or sobbed in the snow. Cassandra pushed it from her mind, but the was robbed of her breath as they came in sight of where the temple had been.

            Soldiers emerged through the falling ash, a pair of which dragged an unconscious elven woman between them.

            “Seeker… she…” one fumbled with her words.

            “She came out of the Fade,” the second holding the elf’s arms said. “Shes’ alive, just barely.”

            “There was a woman of light with her. It was Andraste, Seeker… Andraste sent her to us!”

            “Maker’s breath,” Varric muttered.

            “Bind her hands,” Cassandra ordered. Ash marred her cheeks, eyes reddened and lips grim. The looming grief panged in her chest, anger driving her limbs and disbelief clouding her thoughts, as the soldiers bound the limp body of Lavellan.

            The sky glowed green, crackling with energy and life from the Fade, filling the air with the perpetual howl and soul-pulling shrieks of the demons who found their way out.

            “Search for survivors, and you – retreat to Haven with that elf!” Cassandra called, and led the rest into the ruins. They choked on the cold air, the sky roiling with clouds, sinister and thieving.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            “I don’t care what it takes! She is the only survivor, the only one who knows what happened. For all we know, she is the one who killed the Divine!” Cassandra loomed over the alchemist.

            “I don’t know what’s wrong with her, Seeker.” The man cringed. “I cannot wake her. She hasn’t changed since we spoke yesterday. I am sorry, but I’m doing the best I can.”  
            “Perhaps I might be of assistance.” An elvhan man stood in dungeon corridor.

            “Seeker Pentaghast, I tried to stop him, he… he surrendered in the town square.” There was a reverend mother in his wake. “He said his name is Solas…”

            “What?” Cassandra’s eyes hardened when she saw his stave. “A mage.”

            “Yes. And I am an expert on the Fade. I may be able to help you with the Breach in the sky.” His eyes turned to the unconscious woman on the dungeon floor. “And her.”

            There was a rumble from outside that vibrated through the stone, and the mark upon the Dalish elf’s hand sparked to light, flaring with energy and seizing her body. Two strides brought him to the mat, and he took her hand in his, eyes narrowed to appraise the mark that followed her fate line. A furrow flickered on his brow. “Is she a mage?”

            “I… I don’t know. We have not been able to wak her since she… stepped out of the Fade.”

            “Fascinating,” he murmured, thumb skirting the edge of the mark, the thrum within it pointed. “Who is she?”

            Cassandra still hovered, and it was a moment before she said, “No one knows. I did not think the Dalish were invited to the Conclave…”

            “I have never seen anything like this,” Solas said. A glow in his own hand probed the edges of the Veil, and the warped scar responded with a spark. The Dalish seized again, air choking in her throat, and he stood to summon a glyph. “It’s killing her.”

            “She cannot die!” The same steel held in Cassandra’s eyes as hung from her hip. “She is the only one who knows what happened!”

            “The hole in the Veil is a more dire matter. If it cannot be closed…” Solas stood up, extending the glyph that kept the Dalish rejuvenated. He knelt again, turning her face in his palm to draw back her lids and look at her unfocused eyes. The tremors were gone from her limbs, but her pallor was fading. “I fear what it may do.”

            “I am well aware of what may happen, what is happening. What soldiers we have already fight demons pouring from the rifts that open.” Cassandra paced a few steps. “You said you are an expert on the Fade, can you close it?”

            Solas still regarded the crackling mark. He shook his head slowly, before realizing the Seeker addressed him. “I do not know. But we shall see.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            The world shaped into being the moment Solas was there, no grogginess, no confusion, just the familiar presence of the Fade all around him. The Breach that marred the other side loomed here too. Presences he had easily sought for years were long absent, the turmoil in the spirits palpable. The Breach was as much a threat to them as it was to the survivors in the mountains.

            The presence of the unconscious Dalish elf was here though, a mild reassurance. The mark on her hand, indeed, her very being seemed to carry an echo of the same magic that tore through the Veil. Solas became a mere spectre and stepped through into her dream, where a handful of sprites were children playing. He saw the elf fresh with vallaslin, but without the scars that lay beneath, the years smoothed away. Though newly adult, she ran and played with the children, their laughter bright and so distant from the threat to her physical form.

            The Dalish woman was still alive. Though no other spirits came to help, it was progress none the less. Something he could take to the Seeker; something to stave off his own frustration and anger at his futile attempts to elicit any reaction from the Breach.

            A group of humans approached the Dalish, ragged and worn, obviously starving and lost. The woman corralled the children, quick elvhen words sending them to run and hide better this time. He expected her to draw a dagger and drive them off, to kill them where they stood, but no. The memory showed her calm. The humans begged for relief, and it became apparent they were fleeing the Blight. The world reshaped around her, to where she argued with her Keeper. If he stepped closer, her might hear the words, but already he felt that he had trod too far into a private moment. With a turn of hand, Solas withdrew to continue his search.

            Some hours later, he woke to the prodding of Seeker Cassandra. The villagers and surviving pilgrims were battering the chantry door. He was ushered out of sight, down into the dungeon where the Dalish hunter and her guards were hid. He found a place by the prisoner’s side, the same he had occupied since arriving, her hand in his lap. Through another round of prodding tests and magical channels, he tried to heal the damage the mark was causing. It continued to grow by the day. It would consume her. Like the Breach would consume them all.

            But what was an elf with such vallaslin doing at the Conclave? A convert, or perhaps a mercenary. It was clear from the condition of her body she spent a great deal of time training. The mark itself… was familiar, a beacon that pulsed with energy not suited to her training. How it came to be there…

            “Think she’ll wake up?”

            Solas saw the dwarf in his periphery, the pulse of probing mana in his hand fading. “Perhaps.”

            “She’s lucky that you’re here.”

            “She is.”

            Varric issued a heavy sigh, lingering in the shadows, his eyes down upon the pair of elves. It was a moment before he said, “Pretty noble of you to stay and take care of her. Hope it’s not in vain.”

            Solas shook his head, relinquishing the glowing palm. “The knowledge I possess is unique against a problem that threatens the world. We shall see my fortune, I may yet be pressed under the Seeker’s thumb.”

            “I promise, it’s a delight,” Varric said. “Shit, if any of us survive this, I’ll honestly be surprised.”

            “Such optimism,” Solas murmured. He closed his eyes, a pattern in his hands again to test the mark. One had used before. Attempts that proved nothing. There was a convulsion through the Dalish elf’s limbs, that brought a crackle of light and pulse of energy he could taste in the back of his throat. A pulse that roused their guards to move, as it did every time. Now the light glowed brighter, half the width of her palm, tendrils infused with the powerful magic. There was hunger therein.

            Solas was on his feet and down the corridor, the wary eyes of the human guards following him. He ran into Cassandra, whose eyes were heavy and dark, tension around her mouth and coiled in her shoulders.

            “They have stopped for now,” she said, and glanced towards the cells. “And the prisoner?”

            Solas clasped his hands together behind his back. “She may yet wake. Her connection to the Fade stays strong, but the mark continues to grow.”

            “The Breach is growing with it,” Cassandra said, the hard edge of her voice wavering. “The pulses are coming faster.”

            “Indeed. They are connected.” Solas turned towards the stairs.

            “Where are you going?”

            “Someone must try to close the rifts.”

            “The soldiers are in the field fighting the demons. Do not go unarmed.”

            “I am never unarmed,” Solas said, his smirk lacking joviality. “And more than capable of protecting myself.”

            “Let me keep Chuckles company,” Varric said, as he approached from the prison cells. “Bianca can always help if we run into trouble.”

            Cassandra looked between them. “Do not let the villagers see you. They are grieving and already wary of our actions.”

            Solas’ expression flickered and he swept past Cassandra without another word.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            Battered by another bear, it was the only explanation. Taliah Lavellan was limp in other’s hands, it must be her lethallan dragging her to safety. She had done something stupid and rash again. Words wouldn’t form on her thick tongue, her muscles weak. Pain undulated and pulsed through her, radiating from a searing brand in her left hand. She was deposited on the ground as her senses came to, eyes sharpening at the spark of green light in the dark, and the realization she was surrounded by shemlen soldiers. One paced over her and spoke. The fog in her head evaporated.

            “—dead.”

            Lavellan pressed her lips together, eyes following Cassandra. The Seeker swayed back and circled around as there was another spark of green. Lavellan’s breath stuttered, an itch of sensation lurching through her. She unfurled her palm and looked at what was there, the glowing fissure that nearly split her fate line. Her mouth fell open in surprise.

            “What happened at the Temple of Sacred Ashes?”

            “I don’t know,” she whispered. The memories were shredded, fraught with terror and elusive. “I remember a woman…”

            “A woman?” A hooded lady emerged from the shadows beside one of the soldiers. She joined Cassandra and they exchanged quiet words.

            The manacles on Lavellan’s wrists jangled, her eyes unable to turn from the glowing tear in her hand. “Why are you keeping me hostage? What happened?”

            Cassandra sighed and hauled the Dalish elf to her feet. “It is… better if you see for yourself.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            The Breach pulsated overhead, and they were set upon by demons once more, manifesting from the rift that burst to green light above the snow. Solas summoned a barrier around himself, the dwarf, and a few nearby soldiers. The men and women were trembling, exhausted and terrified, while his own face was set in a hard line, a grimace born of frustration and doubt. Hope was waning as the Breach grew, as more rifts appeared, and as more spirits were drawn across the Veil.

            There had to be a way.

            Relief came in the form of the Dalish prisoner at Cassandra’s side, dual blades flashing as she darted into the fray with surprising agility. Lavellan’s limbs ached in response, the pulsating energy of the mark crackling a weal beneath her grip, and each connecting hit brought another flare of light and a rush of energy up her limb. The pain was a hunger tied to her core, an electric jolt that awakened and took focus to ignore. The closer she grew to the rippling Fade rift, the higher the magnetic draw pulled, and she fought closer to its sickly warped surface almost unconsciously.

            The fight sent adrenaline through her limbs, and with the hungering mark, Lavellan felt alive. Felt awake and charged for the first time since… The wisp on her blade passed through with an evaporative hiss and sight.

            “Give me your hand!”

            Taliah was jerked a step towards the rift, her arm in the firm grip of an elven mage. The energetic draw through her limbs sang as her palm opened to the tear, light and energy sparking, joining with the hard fought adrenaline to crackle through her limbs. It were as though her being were drawn out, reaching for the edges of the rift, feeling them ragged and finding a way to mend it. She could feel it at the edges of her fingers, the light magnifying, the tendrils of the connection a searing glow. Drawing her fingers into a tight fist, she felt the tear respond, felt it stitch shut by her touch, and with a jerk the door slammed shut with a clap of sound and energy that washed over them.

            She was left staring at her palm as the crackling light in the mark subsided, momentarily satiated.

            “It seems you hold the key to our salvation.”

            “Wha—“ She looked up into Solas’ blue-gray eyes. “That wasn’t you. This closed it.”

            He nodded in assesnt, eyes upon her hand too.

            “Great, let’s go try it on the big one.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            Lavellan woke with a roof over her head, but the deep pulse and tug in her palm and the vertigo kept her from immediately reaching for a knife. She skirted backward on the bed to press her back to the wall, taking stock of her surroundings, and making eye contact with another elf who immediately dropped what they were carrying. The bottom of Lavellan’s stomach churned as they fell to their knees in seeming supplication. Soon she was alone, left only to consider if this were a finer prison than the last. Her father’s teasing tales of shemlen capturing Dalish for trophies or worse were hastily buried as she called out, but the flat-ear was gone.

            It was with some surprised that she found the door unlocked, and a throng of humans waiting for her outside. Waiting without shackles, without a headsman’s axe, not an arrow trained on her. She almost shut the door again.


	2. Foreign Foundations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stuck in the middle of the Inquisition formation and uplifted in a faith she has no foundations in is overwhelming. Lavellan needs something to remind her of home.

            Lavellan’s feet carried her away from the war room and the leaders of the new found ‘Inquisition’. A shemlen religion and a shem group to spearhead the effort to fix the sky. To protect her from those who would want her dead. She tightened her hand on the itch and persistent throb embedded in her left hand, hiding the still foreign glow. Closing her hand on the gap in her memories, and seized by a wave of claustrophobia, her momentum carried her out the front doors of the chantry. Beyond the mothers and lay sisters who huddled by the door, who averted their eyes as she passed and bowed their heads, past the few templar survivors of the blast, and the townsfolk who sat gawping by the fire.

            It wasn’t long before she was past the gates of Haven, silently moving over the snow in the growing twilight. Lavellan’s chin was up, even if her eyes were almost unfocused in distraction, easily able to pick the familiar stones and clusters of trees back up the slopes to where her camp was hidden from shem eyes; hidden from everyone who looked to her and mouthed the words of some unfamiliar chant. A bedroll and cache were hidden in a clutch of stunted pines, their boughs heavy with snow, and her shelter still intact. There was no hesitation as she ducked and crawled into the close confines.

            It was there, laying on her stomach and watching the sky that Lavellan realized she could easily disappear. She could leave and find her clan, it would be dawn before anything was amiss. She could make it many miles before then.

            Would the Nightengale send scouts in her wake, would their Commander have soldiers track her back to the Free Marches? Staring at the sky, she envisioned her fleeting path out of the mountains and north past Lake Callenhad, tracking and hunting, evading them as they sought her in villages where she would never go. Once Herald of Andraste, hope to seal the rifts, but now just the knife-ear that killed the Divine, running from justice. Would she make it to the sea before she was forced to fight for her life?

            Her palm unfurled, a green blossom that sent light over the snow at the edge of the entrance. It matched the same glow in the whorling clouds that dominated the sky, draining into the crackling Breach. The clouds completely masked the stars. The itch in her hand was stronger here, further up the mountain and in the shadow of the tear.  The worming pain was magnified above the low level strum that persisted in Haven, reminiscent of the pulse that woke her in the dungeon alongside her jailor’s voice.

            Closing her eyes, Lavellan laid her cheek on her crossed arms, listening to the wind and rustle of the boughs overhead. The sounds of chatter and steel were far away, the smells and confines of the town absent. Shuffling forward, she pulled a clutch of boughs over the entryway, curled up in her bedroll and slept, imagining that the aravels and laughter of her clan were just out of sight.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            Lavellan woke before dawn, almost thinking herself home before a shiver ran through her. Tucked in the end of the small shelter were an extra set of clothing, and the dagger her father gave her before he disappeared. It wasn’t as good as the pair she lost at the temple, its leather grip was worn and faded, but it was still sharp. Most of all, her bow was there. The last bow mamae made. Lying back as pre-dawn light filtered through, she held it to her chest, feeling the distance from her clan all over again.

            She was used to the distance, to weeks away as she scouted ruins and tracked movement of shemlen farmers and troops and other prey. But an end was always in sight. They were brief, no matter how long they took. Drink and welcoming embraces awaited, Luthien’s eager eyes to see what she returned with. They were the brief times mamae smiled, and Lavellan’s lips could find her cheek, could hug her close. Tipsy and surrounded by lethallan.

            The familiar, properly fitted clothes were cold on her skin, stiff and almost frozen. Lavellan knew she should have built a fire, but she wanted the air and the hunt. The sky was lit by the Breach when she emerged, the sun still behind the mountains. It gilded the snowy landscape in hoary green. 

            The sun was up by the time Lavellan found a slope where a group of rams grazed, nosing the snow to expose the grasses and forbs beneath. Her feet were numb and her cheeks were wind burnt, but her head and lungs were clear and her hands steady. An arrow loosed and speared a ram in the neck, sending the others scattering and spattering blood on the snow. A blessing to Andruil was murmured on her lips as she hoisted it over her shoulders and began to walk. The ache down her back reminded her how long it had been since she’d taken a kill so big alone. How long would it be before she could hunt properly with other elvhen…

            Righting herself, Lavellan froze in place as she saw the smoke from Haven and the Inquisition camps in the distance. The saturated glow of morning was waning, and when the wind slowed she could hear them, and the weight returned to her gut.

            “They are quite worried regarding your absence.”

            Lavellan had the dagger from her thigh and the ram dropped, poised to face her tracker. Her tension only half-bled when she saw Solas. “How long have you been following me?”

            “I found your tracks as sunlight broke the mountains.”

            Lavellan narrowed her eyes and smirked, the dagger sheathed as she huffed, “And you’ve let me carry this alone the whole way?”

            A thin grin broke, and Solas tucked his stave behind his back. “I apologize.”

            Hands on her hips, Lavellan looked at the stunted trees nearby, and wove between a few until she found one her height. She cracked the base of the trunk with her foot, before leaning to hack the remainder with her dagger. Kneeling in the snow, she looked back at Solas as she stripped the branches. “Why did you follow me?”

            “The Seeker believed you had abandoned them. I thought otherwise. I doubted they would find you, and offered to look.”

            “Ah. Not just a mage,” Lavellan’s eyes dropped, blade flicking the needles away. She exhaled out, breath visible in the cold air. She shaved long strips of supple wood for twine. “I thought about it.”

            “Yet here you are.”

            “Funny that,” she said, and glanced at him as she went back to the ram and trussed it on the pole. “You decided to stay as well.”

            Solas’ glanced skyward before he knelt to tie the ram’s legs with her. “At least until the Breach is sealed.”

            “You know what you’re doing, that is rare for…” Lavellan huffed out a breath and looked at their work. She swallowed _flat-ear_ as she met Solas’ gaze. She flexed her stiff, cold hands. “It is… difficult being surrounded by so many shemlen. To be in their buildings, in their town.”

            “Were you raised in isolation?”

            “I always thought less than most Dalish.” They hoisted the ram up between them, the pole buoyed between them. “There are too many eyes upon me down there. Even if I don’t care what they think. I am not one of them. They know it, and so do I.”

            “Perhaps that relates more to the mark upon your hand.”

            Feet crunched over snow as they descended the slope with care. Lavellan had a passing glance for her hand, the same green glow sparking therein as deformed the sky. Her lips pressed into a fine line.

            Solas carried his share of the weight without qualm. His voice was low and almost mocking, “You have stabilized the Breach, protecting us all from the demons. You alone close the rifts, the Herald, hero sent from the Maker to save them.”

            Lavellan smirked, eyes forward. “Do you believe that?”

            “Hardly.”

            “Well,” she said, adjusting the weight of the ram as they walked on. “That’s a relief. I may not know much about the Chantry and its dogma, but I know what I’m not.”

            “No doubt that will change.”

            “Lucky me,” she muttered. They were in sight of the tents now. Cullen and Seeker Pentaghast were at the gates of Haven. Her arms were crossed. “And what prize do you get for bringing me back, Solas? Maybe I should be the one strung up.”

 


	3. Escape the Hinterlands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just when Taliah Lavellan is getting comfortable with their work in the Hinterlands and the familiar feel of wilderness, they make for Val Royeaux to address the Chantry. 
> 
> (I am sorry, I am terrible at chapter descs)

            Camp nestled in the farm fields of the Hinterlands was a welcome sight that night. Scouts would go the next morning to dismantle the templar encampment and ensure the nearby refugees got the supplies. Cassandra had all but insisted they stay to burn the bodies, and out of respect, Lavellan acquiesced. It meant that she and Solas led them back to camp in the dark, it meant stumbling and cursing for Varric, and getting caught in at least one bush for the Seeker. But it was done.

            Lavellan was down to her under armour without much thought, the night air cool on the bruising down her arms and the deep gash in her thigh. She rinsed it and applied a salve, in her smalls now to stitch her wounds when Varric cleared his throat. When he was met with her blank stare rather than modesty, he nodded and just sat down beside her, offering a drink of his flask. She took a swig, teeth grit as she tugged the mending thread.

            “Thanks.”

            “Seems appropriate to drink when the Herald of Andraste strips down in the middle of camp.”

            “Does it bother you?”

            Varric cleared his throat. “Not at all. I only thought to protect our dear Seeker’s sensibilities.”

            “She can have the tent, I need the firelight to see what I’m doing,” Lavellan said through her teeth. When she finally cut the thread, she turned to inspect her work, before working a liniment into the muscle around it. “Do you have any wounds that need tending?”

            “Nah,” Varric said, and took another drink. “I think you and Chuckles took the brunt of it. Well, and Cassandra, but I don’t think she’d mention being hurt even if her limb were hanging by a thread. If she even gets hurt.”

            Solas appeared at the edge of the fire light, hoisting his river-rinsed jacket onto the rope strung by the fire, beside Cassandra and Lavellan’s sweat soaked armour. He exhaled and sat down by the fire in just his tunic and leggings, his staff laid down behind him.

            “Are you alright?”

            “Yes. Thank you.”

            “I don’t think I have the mental capacity tonight – I promise we’ll pick up the Wicked Grace the next moment we’re not bloodied or being attacked.”

            “I’d like that,” Lavellan said. She offered a close-lipped grin as Varric stood and disappeared into the second tent. She exhaled and extended her bare feet towards the fire. The stars were out and the wisps of clouds that dragged over them were still coloured from the last vestiges of day. She ached, her eyes were heavy and her limbs sore, but everything felt better under open sky. Her eyes turned  as Solas tracked the edge of their camp, laying down protective wards in small bursts of light and magical energy.

            They said nothing as he returned and laid out a bed roll on the opposite side of the fire, but it said enough to her. That perhaps Haven felt like a trap to him as well. That he walked the world with the same calloused feet. She thought of the boots Leliana had given her, still waiting in that room beside the bed they said was ‘the Herald’s’. Solas let out a slow breath, she could hear it above the crack and snap of the slumping fire.

            “What do you see when you dream here?”

            “Why?”

            Lavellan clasped her hands together on her abdomen, the wool blanket up to her armpits, eyes back on the stars now. “From everything you’ve said, it sounds like you experience so much more than the rest of us. I don’t feel like I have any control over my own dreams. The refugees, the scouts… they talk about what’s happened here.”

            “It lingers. The people, the battles, their thoughts and dreams, their actions. It all shapes the Fade. The Hinterlands lie heavy with scars from the Blight. Armies marched these lands at a forced pace, racing to Denerim and the archdemon that awaited them. Like a beacon she shone, the Hero of Ferelden at their stead.”

            Lavellan’s blinks grew heavy. The salve on her wounds was hot and tingling. Each time her lashes fell her senses slipped, and she almost thought she were back with her clan. She licked her lips. “Does the Breach affect what you see?”

            There was movement on the other side of the fire, and it was a moment before Solas said, “Many spirits have been driven away. It is… not the same. It is difficult to explain.”

            “It’s worse in Haven, isn’t it,” she murmured, flexing her left hand. The glow was subdued away from the Breach, away from the rifts. The tug she felt within it lessened the further they got from it.

            “Yes. Though it is recovering since you were able to stabilize it.”

            “We - I didn’t do that alone.”

            “Yet it would not have happened without you.”

            She pulled the covers higher and rolled onto her stomach, an arm propped under her cheek. “I didn’t mean to keep you awake.”

            “Another time,” Solas said, the resignation of fatigue in his voice. “Good night.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            “You’ve got to kidding me,” Varric said under his breath.

            Lavellan’s smile grew as she looked at him, standing alongside their newly acquired horses. Her hands found a place on her hips as she said, “I take it you’re not familiar with riding.”

            Varric motioned down his body. “What do you think?”

            “Ride with me then. But I should warn you, I’m not used to a saddle. Or a mount this big, really.”

            “You certainly know how to inspire confidence.”    

            “You may ride with me, if you’d like,” Sola said, from where he sat, already atop the Ferelden Forder, posture confident and the horse moving with ease. He smirked. “Or I am sure Cassandra would assist.”

            Varric raised his hands, eyes closed in the moment he sighed, “It’s fine, thanks. I’ll stick with the Herald.”

            “Don’t feel bad,” Lavellan said, and guided the horse to a block. She patted it and offered Varric a hand. “My concussion only lasted a week the first time I tried to ride a halla.”

            “You’re not making this any better.” Varric was the one with his hands on his hips now.

            Lavellan’s smile softened. “I will find every other reason to mock and deride you, and not have one snide remark for this, if you just get on the horse.”

            “Just tell me what to do,” he muttered, unable to escape Solas’ close-lipped grin in his periphery.

            “Grab this, and swing up… and throw your leg over to try and sit,” Lavellan said, and as Varric moved, she planted her hand on his backside to give him the remaining leverage. “And I grab your ass.”

            “Ladies usually go for the chest hair,” Varric grunted, indelicately shoved up on top of the horse. His brow went up as he leant into the saddle horn. “Maker’s breath.”

            “Scoot forward. It’ll be easier with my legs around you.”

            Varric’s lips flapped and he laughed. “I can make snide comments though, right? Because you are giving me way too much.”

            “Just wait until I grab the horn between your legs,” Lavellan said, and grasped the pommel to mount the horse with much more grace. She shimmied in the saddle, sitting back with Varric nestled in front of her. “We’re going to be sore later.”

            “The best rides always leave you aching,” Solas said, as he led his Forder past them and circled in the corral as Lavellan and Varric both laughed.

            Cassandra shook her head, back straight and chin high. “You are all incorrigible.”

            “I almost feel bad for her,” Lavellan said as she reached around Varric for the reins. The broad horse was almost too much, and she sympathized with his shorter legs.

            “Don’t,” Varric huffed. He shuffled, awkwardly framed by Lavellan’s arms, his legs more forward than down the sides of the horse. They followed Cassandra’s lead out onto the road, and he murmured to her, “For an apostate hobo, Solas sure looks like he knows what he’s doing.”

            Lavellan pursed her lips and pulled up the rear.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            The days spent in the wilderness and on the road helping refugees and common folk were far easier than those in Haven, overhearing Chantry scholars and the glances of the faithful. Lavellan was at ease in the woods, on the hills, soaking in the warmth of a camp fire. She might not have been at ease in the cold, but she was adjusting. When she had time to reflect, it became odd how routine the strangest things could become; people calling her the Herald of Andraste, looking to her with irreverence for a deity she had rarely even considered, shemlen smiling and taking her hand, bowing their heads, humans actually meeting her gaze and not shying from her vallaslin. There were unkind words in the town those first days, but now more and more soldiers and pilgrims came to see the elf who stepped out of the Fade.

            And elves were coming too. Flat-ears from the cities, but she softened the word in her heart. There was no segregation in Haven, there were aides and researchers, smiths and archers, all rallying and fearful of the Breach. They all wanted something to believe.

            It was terrifying is she thought of it for too long.

            Riding to the coast with a retinue of soldiers chased all of those thoughts away though, books in her lap as they rode, asking Solas about the ancient elves by firelight, and Varric kicking her ass in Wicked Grace. They were taking ship to Val Royeaux, a short voyage that was weeks shorter than the land route. The seas were kind, but they were still a reminder of her life and what it had been; what it wasn’t anymore. They were a reminder of hiding in a hold after leaving her clan, hood up and blade on her thigh, listening to the shems slander the few elves aboard, and her own cowardice to not stand up to them.

            The captain on this schooner was all smiles and formality, bowing low with his crew to welcome the Herald on board.

            But as the stars came out, the crew, the Inquisition soldiers, each one gave Lavellan room. Just like in Haven. Like in every camp they made. Cassandra retired to contemplation, Solas to his much desired sleep. It left Varric by her side with a flask to pass between them. Mostly he muttered about the sea, how he hated it, but there was a similar distance in his eyes that spoke of the kin he missed. That his home was across the water too, and he wasn’t travelling to see it either.

            An elf and a dwarf on a boat at the end of the world. Sounded like a bad joke.

            Lavellan listened either way, senses lulled by the drink, and stomach at ease on the calm seas. Varric eventually bowed out to try and sleep in the hold, and she climbed the mast to straddle the crosstree and watch the stars. In the dark of night with the flask emptied, she realized she probably couldn’t get down without killing herself. She fell asleep with an arm and leg tucked into rope, reminiscent of so many nights tracking in the Marches, tangled in a tree for safety.

            Waking sober before dawn, she watched the sun rise across the encroaching land, shaking feeling into numb limbs. She could already see the buildings of the harbour, the docks, the ships, and the sprawling villas glinting with Oreslian gold and blue. The closer they got, the more was revealed from her vantage. They had left behind the basalt, the trees, the storms, and now there was only the manicured roads, spires, roofs, and walls of the massive shemlen city. So much larger than she could have imagined, all Lavellan could do was stay atop the mast, swaying with the slowing motion of the ship and gape.

            The walls of Wycome seemed a trifle by comparison. They had avoided the city whenever possible, and Lavellan had only ventured in once to retrieve an artifact stolen by a flat-ear who had a change of heart after an attempt at clan life. The alienage was a tight, confined place, and she feared now looking at Val Royeaux that this place would be much worse. She knew the words they used, kind or cruel, and what the humans that filled the streets would think of her.

            The weight in her stomach prompted Lavellan to swing and shimmy down the mast. Cassandra’s eyes were on the city, but Solas was nearby, and raised his brow as she stepped onto deck.

            “Safe above it seems,” he said, and when Lavellan looked confused he continued, “Your presence will sooth Varric, no doubt. He was convinced that you fell overboard in the night, left to your own devices with the remainder of his whiskey.”

            “I’m not that much of a lightweight.” Lavellan huffed once and puts her hands on her hips, shaking her head. “I like sitting with a vantage.”

            “Better to see what lies on the horizon.”

            “Yes,” Lavellan said, her eyes to his own. “To see what comes for me.”

            They both looked to Val Royeaux. The crew moved around them, and they shuffled close to the mast to get out of the way. The ship moved up the canal towards the docks, waters lapping at the hull.

            “It was thoughtless to bring you,” she said under her breath.

            “And why is that?” There was the hint of hardness in his voice.

            “It isn’t fair. I know how the shems treat elvhen inside their walls.” Lavellan shook her head, and tucked her thumbs into the pockets of her pants.

            “And the rest of the elves that live there?”

            Lavellan’s lips flapped and she furrowed her brow. “I can’t help them right now.”

            Solas’ brow smoothed and they regarded each other a moment, before he looked back to the city.

            The tension in her chest grew, swallowed now by taverns and inns, cargo ships and barges anchored near the docks. They had slowed considerably, the small ship manoeuvering into a docked berth set far from the shore. Lavellan crossed her arms, shoulders tight. She looked at Solas again before she said, “I wonder what it’ll be like…”

            “Very busy,” he said, and didn’t glance at her as he moved to follow Cassandra towards the gangplank.


	4. Small Freedoms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Allies in Orlais, and elves doing what they do best -- frolicking in the woods.

            One of Leliana’s agents led them from the markets to apartments the Nightingale kept on the edge of the University grounds. Its entrance was hidden behind a garden trellis, and when they reached the upper floors they could see the White Spire too. The rest of the skyline was consumed by the ornate roofs and balconies of the city. Potted flowers, manicured ivy, and pruned trees. Dishonest, hidden faces wherever they looked.

            Lavellan’s crossed arms tightened as Cassandra vented her worries about the Chantry, the bruised grand cleric in the square, and the most worrisome Lord Seeker. The words rolled off Lavellan, her own thoughts taking precendence. The city displaced her from the comfort of her skin, torn out of the world she knew with greater intensity now than she ever had been in Haven. The words ‘foreigner’ and ‘savage’ were meant to deride, but confined in these walls and so far from anything natural, they were closer to what she wanted to be. If she ever blended in with them…

            “Herald?”

            Lavellan sighed. “To me it isn’t up for debate. The templars made their stance clear, they spat on us while the mages extended a hand in peace.”

            “The mages are responsible for the suffering we work to undo in the Hinterlands!”

            “As are the templars, Seeker,” Solas said from where he stood in the doorway to the drawing room. He clasped his hands behind his back. “Or is that detail one you are content to ignore?”

            A sound rumbled in Cassandra’s throat.

            “The Lord Seeker publicly undermined the Inquisition.” Lavellan turned from the window and unknotted her arms. “That isn’t a quality I want in an ally, and I don’t see how the templars will help with the Breach.”

            “I’m not getting involved in this shit.” Varric stood up from where he sat with a clutch of letters. “I’ve had enough mages and templars to last a lifetime. So if you excuse me, I have some contacts to drop in on.”

            Lavellan strummed her fingers low on her throat and watched him go.

            “Magic is what we require. It is what your mark needs to magnify its power,” Solas said. “I am certain of it.”

            She opened her palm, the mark there easily lighting with a thought. It still felt foreign, though its hunger had faded. “What makes you say that?”

            “Were you a mage, the sensation would be familiar. It is different, but of the same force. It is magic. No doubt Cassandra can feel it well enough, given her training.”

            Cassandra’s lips were a line before she said, “It is.”

            “Thus mages will amplify its power, rather than be dampened or nullified by a templar’s bumbling.”

            “Something to discuss further in Haven.” Lavellan’s closed fist rubbed her fingers into the mark, feeling the power therein warp and muffle, quieted for now. She paced past the window and looked out at the city again. Her eyes wandered beyond the apartments to where a distinct wall was in the distance; the alienage. The words in the market and the looks cast her way… that was where she should be, shouldn’t she. The thought brought a sudden palpitation in her chest. The copper plated ceiling felt oppressively close, the walls too narrow, and she scarce noticed running into a side table as she moved. “Damn it.”

            Cassandra raised a brow, moving to pick up the table and book that had been upon it. “Something on your mind.”

            Lavellan scrunched her shoulders and she shook her head. “So Madame de Fer’s salon this evening, you’re sending me alone?”

            “Yes.”

            Lavellan shook her head again. “Great. What’s a salon? What’s the point?”

            “A party,” Solas offered, and his brow knit as he regarded her. “No doubt she will entertain guests so as to be seen with you. Politicking.”

            “She is the court enchanter and First Enchanter of the Circle in Montsimmard.”

            “Wouldn’t you be better suited to this, Cassandra?” Lavellan’s hand crept up the side of her neck, until finally she brought them both down to her hips. “You’re right hand of the Divine. People do know that I am Dalish, don’t they? Or is that another inconvenience that hasn’t been spread along, unlike the holy title that’s been thrust upon me.”

            Cassandra bristled. “They’re aware. And if not, they will be when they see you.”

            “Yes,” Lavellan huffed. “The ears give me away, don’t they?”

            “I will ride north with you to the chateau.”

            “What about you, Solas?”

            “Hmm?”

            “Are you going to ride with me too, or stay here and sleep?”

            His eyes narrowed briefly, brow easily swayed to his expressions. A smile ghosted over his lips before smoothing away. “Did you require my presence, or do I have the option?”

            “Not required, but always welcomed.” Lavellan rifled her hands over her head, moving again and almost kicking a chaise lounge in her harried movement. “It’s really up to you, but I have to get out of here.”

           

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            It was dark by the time Taliah Lavellan came down the steps of the Duke de Ghislain’s chateau, head swimming from champagne and stomach as tight as her shoulders. The Inquisition wanted allies. And so she was puppeted in front of the humans while they tittered and drank, eyes dark behind masks and her in mail and dust from the road. Free sky stretched above the manicured lawn and gardens that followed the lane out of the chateau, and she stopped and turned her face up to it. The wind ruffled her hair and she could smell water and leaves, the sounds of Val Royeaux proper far enough away to be insignificant. Even the salon seemed far away.  The stars were coming out, the last vestiges of day cooling on the horizon.

            Cassandra rose from where she honed her sword when she saw Lavellan. Solas merely opened his eyes from where he sat in a meditative posture at the roadside. They were on the horses in a few moments more, riding on the dark road back into the dense corridors of the city. Cassandra led the way, while she and Solas rode side-by-side.

            “Do you know much about the Circles, Solas?”

            “I have never seen one, nor would I want to.”

            Lavellan kept her voice low. “They feel driven by fear. I think of all my Keeper was able to do for our clan. What Luthien – her first – was able to. I look at you. It seems like mages could be such a boon to everyone, but humans are so afraid of ‘coulds’ that they’d rather stamp it out than even try.”

            Solas watched her as he rode, and offered a brief nod. “Even now, so much has been lost.”

            “You said that spirits reflect what people do and say in this world, and that is why we see the demons. I wonder how much that fear of magic, the suffering of the mages, of everyone who’s lost family to a Circle… That can’t have a good effect.”

            “Indeed,” he said

            “Thank you for staying.”

            “Well, it seems I was able to ride with you _and_ sleep,” Solas said, a grin on his lips as he regarded her.

            “I meant with the Inquisition,” Lavellan chuckled.

            “Ah,” he said, and turned his head to the road. “I will stay, at least until the Breach has been closed.”

            “Was that in doubt?”

            “I am an apostate mage surrounded by Chantry forces, and unlike you, I do not have a Divine mark protecting me. Cassandra has been accommodating but…”

            “You’ve done nothing but help, Solas, I won’t let them use that against you.”

            “And how would you stop them?”

            “However I had to.”

            Solas’ eyes turned to her again now, honest surprise in his voice. “Thank you.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            The same captain took them back across the sea, their voyage ahead of the polar opposite pair who had pledged themselves to the Inquisition’s cause in Val Royeaux. Off the ship and back on shore, they took waiting horses from a camp outside the small port town , and took road back to Haven. They stopped midday when the rain finally stopped, and Lavellan was the first off her horse, breathing in the crisp air. Not a building in sight, just them and the few Inquisition soldiers and recruits that were waiting. They kept their distance, regarding her with a cautious admiration. But for now it didn’t matter, there was clear air, the smell of pines and rain, and it was quiet.

            “You’ll grow accustomed to it,” Cassandra said to Varric as he walked bow-legged and shook his feet.

            “Somehow I doubt it,” he murmured.

            “We’re stopping for a while?” Lavellan asked.

            “Yes,” Varric said, before Cassandra could reply.

            Lavellan shrugged off her mail and stripped to her the tunic and leggings underneath. “Then I’m going for a run. Care to come? It’ll help, I promise.”

            “What? Why are you looking at me,” Varric said, and shook his head. “There’s a reason I use long range weaponry.”

            Cassandra shook her head when Lavellan glanced her way.

            “Then what about you?” She took the few steps to where Solas scratched the neck of his horse. 

            “A run?”

            “Though I understand if you can’t keep up, hahren” Lavellan backpedalled barefoot through the undergrowth and between the thick trees. “Maybe it’s best to rest your weary bones.”

            “Is that a challenge?”

            “Not much of one I think,” she said and smirked, turning to dart off through the trees.

            Solas only stood a moment watching her backside, before he grumbled, shucked his coat, and let his feet carried him after her.

            “This is why people think elves are weird,” Varric muttered.

            The branches flew past and Lavellan took slow breaths, running at an easy pace with long strides and sure footsteps. She glanced to see Solas a few strides back and called out, “I didn’t think that would work.”

            Solas half-laughed.

            The trees were quiet, scarce a leaf or branch cracking underfoot as they ran and her smile grew. She saw a path in the trees, elk or ram perhaps, and turned to follow the trampled brush, drawing out into full stride in the space between the trees. Each breath brought the sap scent, the moss, the damp boughs all around, and drove her legs harder. She leapt down a small bank and landed along a rocky stream, glancing to see if Solas following before she took off again.

            “Do you do this at Haven?” He said it as though they sat idly and chatted.

            “Yes. I’ve always loved it,” she said, and skidded down an incline of brush, knocking rocks and moss free before grabbing a low branch and launching and ahead to the other side of the stream. “The way the air moves over me, on my face, in my hair, pushing through the wind and swept up in the breeze you make. Everything falls away. It’s feeling free.”

            She took a deep breath and her stride never faltered. She darted up the bushed bank when she saw an opening beneath an oak and she laughed, the sound kept close by the trunks. “You’re doing better than I thought you would.”

            “You doubted me, I am wounded.”

            Lavellan laughed again. “I’m sure. Don’t hurt yourself just to keep up.”

            Solas harrumphed.

            She snuck between two trees, and kicked a bit of deadfall in her tracks, leaping forward to keep going as her smirk widened.

            “Is that how you treat me, da’len?” Solas’ voice was false disdain.

            “A slip, hahren,” Lavellan called, equally stressing the word. She carried through the underbrush with only a hush of sound. “Ir abelas.”

            There was a familiar ripple in the Veil that brought a tug in her mark, and Solas reappeared a few meters ahead of her, midstride and still running.

            “That’s cheating, you bastard!”

             “Tel’abelas,” he called amidst a laugh. “Each must use their skills to the best of their ability.”

            Lavellan shook her head and strained her limbs to catch him, her eyes fallen down his thighs and calves, the muscles taut in his leggings with the strides—and ran smack into his back as he skidded to stop. Her breath was heavy, and she pulled her hands from his back as she said, “Giving up? I don’t blame you.”

            Solas shook his head and hushed her, when a black mass some meters away rose up from where it was hunched over a berry patch. The bear’s eyes turned on them, and they froze.

            “Oh shit.” Lavellan grabbed Solas’ shoulder, and they both turned and ran, the roar of the bear on their heels. Their fleet feet carried them over deadwood and brush, faster now than before, breath coming hard on her lips. She could hear the paws of the bear crash and beat through the brush behind them.

            “If we stop for a moment,” Solas said from her right. “I might be able to scare it off.”

            “If we step for a moment, it might be able to maul us,” Lavellan said. They clamoured over a fallen pine, and sprinted across the stream, feet splashing in the water. Down the streambed they ran, making headway across the pebbles. But the bear was still there. She started laughing as they ran, only making her gasps for breath worse, and soon Solas was smirking too.

            Further downstream, Lavellan scrambled by some rapids and darted into the trees. She spun to stop at the base of an oak whose branches were high and strong, calling out, “Solas, here.”

            “No—“

            “Trust me!” she called, already shimmied half way up the trunk. Swinging up onto a branch, she reached down for him as the bear lumbering up the bank. “You can cast from up here.”

            Solas jumped and she caught his arms to haul him up into the branches with her. They both scrambled to their feet, gasping for breath. Lavellan shrunk against the bark and fell silent as she could. The pair pressed together in the branches as the bear ran by, snout up to take in the air. Leaning into her for balance, Solas’ hands moved and the bear was enveloped in ice.

            “Go!”

            A barrier sprung around them, and they leapt down, tumbling into the brush, and Lavellan swore again as they clamoured up and kept running. She pointed to familiar gash in a tree, and they swerved, long strides carrying them still. It was only when they heard voices that they slowed, panting and limbs singing, and saw the bear was nowhere in sight. Lavellan started laughing again, bent over with her hands on her thighs.

            “Remind me,” Solas said between breaths, hands on the small of his back, “To thank you for the run.”

            “Later?”

            “Later,” he laughed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ir'abelas -- I'm sorry  
> Tel'abelas -- (I'm) not sorry


	5. Glances and Grace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rains in the Mire and rebel mages in Redcliffe.

            It was Lavellan’s face Solas saw when he opened his eyes. Relief spread across it in a flash of lightning, and he had to blink a few times as raindrops fell in his eyes. He saw how her vallaslin hid a deep scar that ran down her right jawline. Not hid. Distracted from.

            “That’s a relief,” she said, and put a hand on his cheek. There were dark circles around her eyes. “You with us, Solas?”

            More of the world came into greater focus, the day had left them, and the dark clouds of the Mire crackled with lightning. The thinness of the Veil was palpable, the presence of the dead pinpoints of sensation across the waters when he blinked. Solas’ breath rattled, pain coming with it, and he closed his eyes as a wash of dizziness rose through him. “I am fine.”

            “Uh huh,” Lavellan said, and threw Solas’ good arm over her shoulders anyway.

            “How long was I out?” He sucked air, a crackle in his throat as she hauled him to his feet. There was a trio of stabbing pain in his midsection, and his vision almost closed again. He swore instead.

            “You’ll have to teach me that one?”

            “Pardon?”

            Lavellan grinned, and helped him test his steps. “The more curses I can have for my repertoire the better.”

            “He’s awake,” Cassandra said as she approached, exhaling in relief. Blackwall was with her. “Thank the Maker.”

            Lavellan snorted, even as Blackwall came to take Solas’ other arm.

            “I can walk,” Solas groaned, and tried to pull away, only to shudder and swear again, his free arm weakened by a deep shoulder wound. He braced a hand on the stave Lavellan gave him, and traced a glyph that sent a rush of light up his limbs in rejuvenation.

            “Did you find solid ground?” Lavellan asked, and took his arm again as he wavered.

            Cassandra nodded. “The boardwalk that leads there is broken, but there is dry ground that is sheltered from the wind at least.”

            “And it’s defensible,” Blackwalk said, hovering nearby as Solas finally let Lavellan help him start to walk.

            “Good.” Lavellan’s hand linked around Solas’ waist. “Tell me if I’m hurting you.”

            Solas huffed once, and they took the path away from the runed pillar. The night grew dark and the rain heavier, weighing down their clothes. His head sagged and the world grew thick, and when he felt himself nodding, Lavellan’s voice was by his ear.

            “Tell me about where you’ve gone. Ruins and that, right? In the Fade.”

            “What?”

            “Can’t close your eyes yet, we’re still walking. Unless you want Cassandra or Blackwall to cradle you in their arms and carry you the whole way? All I have to do is ask.”

            “Ah…” Solas blinked rapidly and drew a breath, rain running down his face. “My thoughts are… muddled, I apologize.”

            “That demon knocked you pretty hard,” Lavellan said, and adjusted his weight. His hand wound under the chainmail at her shoulder, and he tried to take his weight on his staff. “Am I wounding your pride? Though if you ask me, Solas is already wounded.” She stressed the word, and he chuckled once, a groan close on its heels. “I don’t mind helping. Knowing my past, you’ll be carrying me out of battle, bloodied and half-dead soon enough.”

            “I hope not,” he murmured, blinking heavily.

            “I’m not that heavy.”

            The edge of his lips turned up, and Solas glanced at her. “My preference would be for you to not be half-dead at all.”

            She grinned. “I’ve enough scars to accept it will happen again. But maybe there are enough good people around to make sure I don’t die, at least.”

            Their path was thankfully clear, and the pull of muck and gurgling water plucked underfoot. Solas pulled away as they reached the drowned boardwalk, his brow turned down as harshly as his mouth. Lavellan lifted her hands and let him struggle across the water, and much to her surprise, he left it undisturbed. She leapt over and followed, keeping pace with his slower gait.

            “It is not far now,” Cassandra said. They passed beneath a rough stone arch and the wind died, though lightning still flashed overhead. There was a raven waiting on the lone tree on the far side of the small clearing, a familiar red-dyed feather on its crest. It squawked when it saw them, and Cassandra went to pet it.

            “How do they know?” Blackwall asked.

            “It was following us,” Cassandra said. “Didn’t you see it?”

            “Hmm.” He furrowed his brow.

            “You’ll send word back?” Lavellan said, reaching for the leather tarpaulin strapped to Cassandra’s back underneath her shield. With Blackwall’s help, they staked it to the tree and the rock wall to create a lean-to barely large enough for them. Solas leant heavily on his staff, the rain lighter but still a steady drizzle down his shoulders, the water soaked through.

            “I will take the watch,” Cassandra said, once a brief missive was rolled and tucked into the satchel on the raven’s leg. It nuzzled her hand before taking off.

            “Might be best if we scout ahead. Haven’t seen those Aavar yet, and I don’t trust them.”

            “Perhaps,” Cassandra said and nodded to Blackwall. “Inquisitor?”

            “We shall tend to our wounds,” Lavellan said, her smile thin. As they walked away, she called, “Be careful.”

            Solas opened his eyes, from where he was still slumped against his staff. “You’re hurt.”

            “Not as bad as you. Made it all the way here, didn’t I?” she said and wiped the rain from her face. She tossed her pack down at the base of the tree. “Besides, I didn’t think a poultice would do in the rain. Sit.”

            Solas arched his brow.

            “Please -- or did you need help down?”

            He huffed and staked his staff to ease himself down onto the damp ground. His own pack clanked beside hers, and he sucked a pained breath through his teeth as he shuffled to shuck his coat. Lavellan knelt down under the tarp and watched as he struggled, her hand filling the space with a subtle green glow. He finally looked at her, his shoulder dropped at an odd angle to slip his stave sling.

            “I took an arrow out of there, you know.” She smirked and pointed at his shoulder. “It’s alright to let people help you.”

            “Like you do.” he murmured, the sling off and a breath huffed out at the pain. He leant back against the stone, down to his sweater, the rain on his brow mingled with sweat as he regarded her glance askance.

            Lavellan’s smirk didn’t fade though, a chuckle rumbling in her throat. “I’ll ask you next time. Just a lot of bad bruises for me tonight.”

            “Here.” He shimmied his sweater up, before taking the poultice from her and planting it in the dark bruising on his abdomen. He smoothed the leaf, and she came in with a length of cloth, leaning over him without a word to wrap it firmly around his midsection to secure the poultice.

            “Anything broken?”

            “I don’t think so, but it will be a lingering pain,” he said. Their foreheads almost touched. Her hands smoothed the fabric alongside his, before winding around the cloth around his stomach for another layer. There was a flash of lightning that lit the glisten of rain on her neck. She tucked the end in, and when her hand touched his side it elicited a twitch and there was a titch of sound in his throat.

            “I’m sorry, did that tickle?” she murmured by his cheek.

            “Not at all.” Solas jerked his sweater down over the bandages.

            Lavellan sat back on her haunches and tugged down the shoulder of his sweater to look at her handy stitch work there. It was clotted at least.

            “To your satisfaction?”

            “It’ll do.” She pulled the last health potion from her pack and put it into his hand. “Drink that and get some sleep. I’ll stay up until Cassandra and Blackwall return.”

            Lightning was met with the peal of thunder, rumbling through the stone and ground, the rain steady on the leather overhead. The glass sat in Solas’ hands, his eyes on Lavellan as she shuffled to crouch with her back to him, poised like when they

hunted in the mountains, read to move at whim. The poultice grew hot, seeping warmth and drowsiness into his senses, yet he held the Fade at distance a moment more. Her toes flexed in the wet grass.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            The Iron Bull and his chargers were waiting by the crossroads in the Hinterlands, his horns more than a head above anyone else nearby. Not that there were many nearby; his motley crew were given a wide berth by the refugees and farmers. Lavellan stayed atop her horse as they rode up to stay eye to eye with him, while Varric sat behind her with a book in hand. Solas’ own horse swung its head to munch grass behind them.

            “Was wondering when you’d show. Can’t say there’s much to do here while we waited.”

            “Sorry, there were… delays in Redcliffe.”

            “Oh?” Bull arched his brow.  

            Lavellan creased her lips and levelled her gaze. Though quick to speak and good on his word with intelligence from the Ben’Hassrath, a caution lingered about the mercenary. “Yes. With the mages.”

            “Problems with mages, huh? Never heard that one before,” Bull said with a chuckle and casually crossed her arms. “So what do you need us to do?”

            “Want down?”

            Varric shook his head and moved the book from her back, “Naw, I’m good.”  
            “Like you were born to it,” Lavellan said, before dismounting and snagging the map from her saddlebag. “Protect people. We have some carpenters and soldiers building watch towers in the region. I hope they won’t get attacked, but I’d feel better if you were there.”

            “Don’t hear that about the chief very often,” Krem quipped from where he stood at Bull’s right.

            “Maybe you need to get your hearing checked.”

            “Uh huh.”

            “There are also some runners with supplies for the refugees. Blankets, food and the like. They’ll need an escort back to Haven when you’re finished with the watchtowers. I know you’ll be gone a few days, but it’s work the Inquisition needs done.”

            “That’s what we’re here for, boss,” Bull said, and nodded as she laid out the map and marked the first location. “Hopefully these farmers know what good you’re doing for them.”

            “If they’re safe and maybe say something good about the Inquisition, I’ll be happy,” she said, marking the others. Both Bull and Krem towered over her to watch. “We’re here.”

            “Anything else?”

            Lavellan crossed her arms and looked up at Bull. “I’m sure I’ll think of something after you’ve walked away.”

            The Chargers were on the road with the soldiers before she got back up on the horse, almost knocking the book from Varric’s hands. She sighed, “Back to Haven then.”

            “You don’t wish to stay and help,” Solas said, his own mount waiting as Lavellan came about. “For them to see the Herald with their own eyes?”

            Lavellan arched her brow to look at him. “I don’t need any credit for it. I’m not going to let these people freeze or starve. I don’t need to be the only one getting their gratitude. I’m not the only one doing the work.”

            “So humble,” Varric murmured, shuffling to get comfy behind her as they took to the road. “Hawke would have taken credit.”

            “Oh? And here you told me we’d have gotten along.”

            “You would have. Arguing over who can pick a lock faster or has better technique with their daggers. End up cutting fingers or losing an ear. Causing more problems than either of you could solve, though that’d mostly be Hawke. It would have been a competition to make the worst pun, to see who could make my eyes roll the hardest. I’m not sure if you’d be able to out drink her, though.”

            Lavellan laughed, taking the lead into the foothills.

            Varris’s eyes were unfocused, swaying in the saddle. “She was also a shameless flirt.”

            “What’s the point in flirting if you’re ashamed of it?” Lavellan glanced at Solas and winked, prompting him to shake his head.

            Varric chuckled too.

            Lavellan tilted her head the other way to say under her breath, “Besides, flirting is how I deal with stress. If we’re all fucked… well, let’s say at least I’d like to be.”

            Varric laughed fully now. “Maker’s breath, I didn’t need to hear that.”

            “Hmm?” Solas’s grin betrayed him.  
            “Believe me, nothing you want to know, Chuckles.”

            Lavellan sighed, voice louder now. “I haven’t gotten laid since I was back in the Free Marches. What, I told you, I’m not ashamed of it. I didn’t think dwarves were as uptight as humans about it.”

            Varric gripped a saddle belt, his whole frame jerking with his laughter. “Oh more so, I’d say.”

            “Well it’s your loss,” she said with a grin, and caught Solas’ eye. “I’m being inappropriate, aren’t I? Not that there’s been time, what with the world ending and the sky torn asunder. It isn’t as easy as getting what you want.”

            The hint of a smile showed on Solas’ lips. “And what do I want?”  
            “We all need sleep no matter what is falling apart. A dream is just a day away.”

            Solas chuckled, riding alongside them. His eyes invariable found Lavellan again, as Varric propped his book up against her back. The road grew steeper through the foothills and thinning trees. “That may be, but if our enemies destroy the world, I would have nowhere to lay my head.”

            “Well, best of luck to you and all of us then.”

            He tilted his head, before looking away from her. His eyes were upon his hands on the reigns, before taking in the mountains around them and returning to her. “In truth, I have enjoyed our travels, experiencing more of life to find more of the Fade.”

            “How so?”

            He held her gaze. “You train to flick a dagger or arrow to its target, the grace with which you move is a pleasing side benefit. You have chosen a path whose steps you do not dislike, because it leads to a destination you enjoy. As have I.”

            Her lips part a moment, unable to look away. “So you’re suggesting I’m graceful?”

            “No. I am declaring it. It was not a subject up for debate.”

            Varric choked on his breath, though the sound was subtle at her back.

            “Mmm,” was the only sound that escaped as she stared at Solas, though he had already looked back to the road. Lavellan jerked her head forward to find the narrowing road too, a peculiar heat in her cheeks. She took in a deep breath.

            “Get me my quill,” Varric murmured.

            “No.”

            “Pardon?” Solas arched his brow, a tweak in his eye as he looked between the pair. Varric was laughing again.

            Lavellan cleared her throat, licking her lips again. “We… should speed up if we want to reach Haven by nightfall.”


	6. Magnetism

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Varric starts to take notice of Taliah and Solas' flirting. And the pair have a conversation about magic and the Veil before they head to Redcliffe to meet with Alexius.

            It was dark when they rode into Haven. The soldiers were in their tents, the cloth dusted in a fresh coat of snow that glowed from the light of the Breach. The town within was bright with firelight, still bustling with activity. After assuring Varric she’d join him for drinks, Taliah Lavellan disappeared into the warmth of the Chantry to report on the mages. It seemed the Tevinter mage Dorian Pavus had tracked them to Haven, and was eager as any to offer his advice on Alexius. The heated debate wore her fatigue thin, and Josephine finally intervened to suggest they resume in the morning.

            Lavellan shucked her armour and threw a capote on to guard against the cold. She slunk past the soldiers and smiths into the back corner of the tavern, where Varric sat and wrote. The rest of the tables were full, but not a head turned in the dim room. He grinned at her and flapped the book closed. “Wasn’t sure you were going to show.”

            “I said I would. Everyone has quite a bit to say on their preferences for mages or templars.”

            “Joy,” he murmured, producing a deck of cards and shuffling them with expert ease. “Let’s see if you’ve learnt anything since last time.”

            “No guarantees.” She sunk into the rickety chair as he dealt a hand.

            Flissa came by with two tankards and Varric offered a wink and his thanks. Lavellan downed half the ale, bitter hops awash on her tongue. Exhaling out, they discarded and went through the motions, her thoughts still fraught with the war table discussions. In her mind there was no doubt that they’d try to take Redcliffe castle to save the mages. It was only a matter of if a Tevinter mage supporting that notion would drive the rest of the the table away. The round continued until she cursed and tossed her cards down. She finished the rest of her ale, sucking air through her teeth to chase away the bile. “You didn’t teach me that.”

            “Of course not, I can’t give away all my tricks,” Varric replied. “Besides, it’s not costing you anything.”

            “Yet.”

            Lavellan smiled weakly at Flissa as she refilled her cup, and she took a gulp before the barmaid’s back was turned.

            Varric’s glass sat untouched, and he shuffled with a flick of the wrist and dealt the cards again. “So… you and Chuckles.”

            “What?” Lavellan wiped her chin as she spit up a bit of foam. She choked and half laughed. “What are you talking about?”

            “Yes, because your flirtations on the highway were completely innocent.”  
            Lavellan smirked and leant forward, her spine and tongue loosening. “I won’t pretend that I’m innocent of anything. But Solas is…”

            Her eyes drifted towards the fire, the timber of his voice and cadence of his words resonating in her thoughts; his delicate fingers cradling his staff, and the stern slant of his brow as he spoke of the Dalish, the shemlen, and the templars. Lavellan only realized she was shaking her head because of the bubble of pleasant wooziness through her.

            She met Varric’s waiting gaze, and discarded, licking her lips a few times before saying. “The word is hahren. It’s a respected elder or clansmen. Not that he can be that much older than me, but he is… knowledgeable and intelligent, especially in our history, and eager to preserve the past. He knows so much, and so, I respect him a lot. Even if he’s a bit of an ass sometimes.”

            “I’m sure.”

            “I’m being serious!”

            Varric still grinned. “So am I.”

            “I’ve never met anyone like him, Varric. He has learnt so much from the Fade.”

            “Look, I’ve only been there once, and it was creepy as shit. So excuse me if I don’t see the appeal.”

            Lavellan grinned too, leaning heavily on one arm as she laid down her cards. “He saved my life when he didn’t have to. I mean, he’s an apostate and he just walked over here. Would we have known this could close the rifts without him? And yes… he’s an elf too.”

            “I noticed that.”

            A sigh flapped Lavellan’s lips as Varric showed his winning hand. He didn’t meet her eyes as he gathered them back up to shuffle. In her distraction was the quirk of Solas’ grin, the spark of his rare laughter and the way it almost snorted at the end. She took up her drink to block Varric’s smart-ass grin, finishing the last of her ale. “He’s become a friend. He understands what my life is… what my life was like before. Creators, this is my life now isn’t it. This hasn’t been easy. I know it hasn’t been for any of us but…”

            Varric reached over the table to pat her hand, smirk renewed as she narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t worry your pretty little toes. Your secret’s safe with me.”

            “There is no secret.”

            “So you don’t mind if I take notes?”

            A gravelly sound rumbled in Lavellan’s throat before she laughed, and Sera darted through the other patrons to smack her hands on the table.

            “There you tits are, deal me in!” She sat down in a chair before glancing between them. “What, I interrupt something?”  
            Varric smiled, his usual cavalier self. “Just shits and giggles, Buttercup. The Herald needs another round.”           

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            “I will have my agents in position by the time you reach Redcliffe Castle.”  
            Lavellan idly rubbed her fingertips into the palm of her left hand. As the day waned, the tugging itch had grown into a deep pain that ran up the core of her arm. It wasn’t the first time the mark had ached so, but she had not a moment to find any salves or exercise to distract herself. She looked into Leliana’s waiting face and offered a thin smile. “Good.”

            “And I would like to join you.”

            A bristling tension rose up her back as she looked at Dorian. “Oh?”

            “I am familiar with the magic Alexius is using, and I am a mage of no small talent. I want to see this resolved as much as you.”

            “As much, that’s quite the admission,” Lavellan murmured and he chuckled, despite her fading smile.

            “He may be a worthwhile ally, should it not go as planned,” Cassandra said, from where she stood between them.

            “And you, Cassandra. I doubt his lackey’s will admit me to the castle if I bring more than a few. We’ll ride before first light.”

            “Of course,” the Seeker said, and inclined her head. Their war room adjourned and Lavellan wandered out into the evening chill. Lay priests and runners were gathered around the fire for supper, laughing and chatting. She snagged a heel of bread for herself, tearing the thick, sourdough into chunks to savour each bite. It was a taste she’d come to love, so very different from the flat breads of her clan. It was the smell and chewy texture too, the rough torn edge of the bread under her nose as she walked to Solas’ shared quarters. She tore more bread as she lingered outside the door, before patting it with a flat hand.

            “Solas?”

            He opened the door, thumb caught against his lips. “Inquisitor. I take it your talks about the Redcliffe mages have concluded?” He licked his lips, and stepped back to welcome her into the warm room.

            She stepped through the doorway, bread still in hand. “Yes. We’ll be meeting with Alexius tomorrow… while some of Leliana’s agents infiltrate the castle and disable any opposition. I was hoping you’d be willing to come.”

            “Naturally.”

            “It is most likely a trap.”

            “A wise assumption,” he said, and inclined his head, pausing when he saw her linger in the door, another chunk of bread wedged into her cheek with her thumb.

            “Is there something else I might aide you with?’      

            Lavellan chewed hard and swallowed too quickly. She almost choked and hit herself in the chest as she coughed, before finally speaking, “I wondered… if you had more thoughts on what closing the breach might entail. And I’ve been thinking about my mark.”

            Solas retrieved his staff and his fur trimmed coat before they stepped outside. “I may not have all the answers you seek.”

            “I’d be worried if you said you did. I trust your opinion at least. And I’m not sure who else to ask about any of it. And I don’t think there is anyone else. That sounds bad. Maybe it’s more about the intersection of your knowledge and beliefs.”

            He followed her down the snowy stairs, a hint of disdain in his words. “Do you know so much about my beliefs?”

            “What?” Lavellan swallowed a glot of bread and tucked her hands into her own furs. “No, I didn’t mean to presume. You’ve been accepting, helpful, and kind. And given what you’ve said and done, I trust you your opinion of magic.”

            “I apologize.” Solas fell quiet as they passed the tavern, and they walked by another crowded dinner fire. “I am not yet accustomed to journeying with others. I appreciate your trust.”

            “I still have my camp outside of Haven. I’d be more comfortable away from prying eyes and ears.”

            “Lead on then.”

            Thankfully the winds were calm beyond the town gates. Lavellan and Solas walked over the snow, sure-footed and silent. As always there was a rumble in the sky from the Breach, and it magnified the worming pain up her arm, and for a moment the mark lit as if calling to its maker. She exhaled hard through her nose.

            “It pains you.”

            “Sometimes worse than others. It’s always worse closer to the Breach.” She rubbed her thumb into it, a soothing comfort that seemed to deaden the throb and pull. “I know I’ve mentioned its magnetism before, especially relating to the Breach. It has a threshold when we’re far enough away. Do you think it would feel the same if I were a mage?”

              Solas’ staff left pock marks with each test of the snow they travelled over. “It is difficult to say. Your mark is not like most magic because of the nature of its origins. I doubt you being a natural mage would alter its abilities. It might be more familiar but hmm…”

            “What is most magic like, then?”

            Solas took a slow, deep breath of the cold air, his eyes invariably drawing up to the whorling green Breach that they walked towards. “Scholars speak of magic once being an intrinsic part of the world. Much of what I have seen in the Fade leads me to believe the same, that spirits, magic, were both as commonplace as the wind or a river. It can take many forms. Yes, a child can drown in a stream, but we teach them of the dangers and they adapt, they learn to use it.

            “That is not the case anymore, and now it is a force separate from us.”

            “Because of the Veil. But it’s inconsistent.”

            Solas grinned at her. “Yes, just so. You can feel it, can’t you?”

            “Yes,” she said, still grinding her thumb into the mark. She splayed her hand out, to feel the tug within, gauging it. The pain had warped into an odd numbness in the muscles of her left arm. “The rifts, or when you’ve said it’s weak… I can feel it here. Do you think it’s the Veil I feel?”

            “It is similar for mages, there is often no physical manifestation, but I can feel the push and pull… it is more than that, though. Where the Veil is thin, that sensation is stronger, and it is much easier for me to exert my own will to draw upon magic and manifest it.”

            They reached her snowed in camp in the copse of trees, and Lavellan took a moment to shake off snow and find her cache of wood. She reached for her flint, but Solas set the kindles aflame, prompting her to prop up her lean-to and sit down on the cold ground. She motioned beside her and he joined her, crossing his legs as her own feet stretched towards the fire.

            Lavellan exhaled heavy, breath visible in the air, toes wiggling in the firelight. “Do mages change it? I mean, the Veil… when there is great magic, or death, or rituals. Or whatever else weakens the Veil.”

            “I believe so. But it is a function of how powerful the spell, or how great the suffering.”

            “That’s worrisome, thinking about everything that’s happened since the Conclave. It almost sounds like suffering, great emotional expense for us, causes an equal response in spirits across the Veil. Could the Breach have formed if hundreds of people hadn’t died?”

            “It is difficult to say. The energy of their deaths would have magnified whatever ritual was conducted, perhaps in hopes of opening the Breach. If the Breach was even a goal. Your mark is indicative of how their plans were disrupted.”

            Lavellan dug the last of the bread from her pocket, and offered it to Solas. He shook his head, before she tore it in two. She chewed it down into her cheek before saying, “If people can be used to fuel magic, is there something inside us that is… the same thing that mages draw upon? What do I draw on then?”

            Solas’ eyes reflected the firelight, rapt gaze upon her. “What is it like when you use the mark?”

            Closing her eyes, Lavellan held out her palm, and the mark glowed brighter with her thoughts. “When we are at a rift, the spirits are still linked to the Fade through it. Their presence strengths it. How can you shut a door when there are people standing in the way? It is…” Her palm opened at the memory, but there was no rift, no demons, just the Breach calling to it, waking the numbness and pain up her arm. Her hand dropped into her lap, and her eyes focused on some point between him and the fire. “I think I can feel the Veil, feel its raw edges. It gives resistance back when I prod it through the mark. Maybe that’s why I can feel to Breach so keenly. As much as I can exert control over these doors, they give something back. Am I making any sense at all, I should probably be reading up on the basics of magical theory, shouldn’t I…”

            Solas met her gaze, his eyes focused on her in curious delight. “They are all opinions. You seem to be forming your own quite well enough.”

            “What about your opinions? I quite like hearing them.”

            Solas chuckled, and his eyes briefly dropped. “It is like any sense we have. How would you describe sight to one born with no eyes? It is why children can call upon magic without any training. Why fire springs to their grasp, because it is second nature to a mage. When I exhale, my breath manifests in the air, a consequence of the action. Magic is the same.”

            “If mages have something in them that can elicit a reaction from the Veil, that is what we hope they can do with the Breach.” Lavellan kept her eyes on Solas as he nodded. “That power, that energy they have, I might be able to channel it.”

            “One can hope,” Solas said. “Who’s to say anyone has ever attempted a feat such as this before?”           

            “How reassuring.” Lavellan exhaled and leant to toss another log on the fire, the snow clung to it hissing in the flames. “We’re leaving before dawn, but I’d like to stay here a bit longer. It’s rejuvenating to be away from all their eyes.”

            “Would you prefer that I go?”

            “Only if you want to. I can share the quiet.”

            Solas nodded, and they both fell silent by the fire, eyes invariably caught on the snag in the sky. Leaning back to look up, Lavellan’s hand came to rest beside his, her breath a seeping fog that took some of her stress with it.


	7. Hushed Whispers

            “Seize them, Venatori! The Elder One demands this woman’s life!”

            There was the ‘thuck’ of arrows and the crack of bone, and Lavellan turned in time to see the Venatori in the wings, dying to Leliana’s stealthy agents. Their bodies fell to the stone. “Your men are dead, Alexius.”

            “You… are a mistake!” The magister stepped towards them and his hand blossomed with magic. “You should never have existed!”

            “No!” Dorian’s staff spun from its slung, and a glance of magic knocked the magister back.

            But it was too late, and a vortex opened between them, warping time and rippling the air. Lavellan scarce had time to cry out before she and Dorian were enveloped. When it collapsed, they were both gone, leaving Cassandra and Solas gaping in its wake.

            “No…” Cassandra righted herself, drawing sword and shield to advance on Alexius. “For the Herald!”

            Staff in hand, Solas summoned a barrier around them, absorbing the crackle of magic that issued from Alexius’ hands. The nearby Inquisition scouts weren’t so lucky, their cries pitched by the power of the energy. Already Cassandra was buffeted away, her sword deflected and slowed. Solas stumbled back, casting even as his mind reeled.

            She was gone. The mark was gone. And the sky was sundered.

            “Seeker, we cannot win!”

            Wiping the blood from her mouth, Cassandra darted behind one of the pillars in the throne room, clutching two of the surviving scouts. “You must get to Haven. Leliana and the Commander must know what’s happened!”

            “Seeker?”

            “We will buy your escape.” A shock of bolts lit the room behind her as she released the scouts, and clashed her sword on her shield. “Go! Now!”

            The throne room doors burst open as the scouts disappeared into the castle, and Cassandra yelled as she ran into the fray. Solas backed against the wall and into shadows, casting to repel the archers and enchanted knights. An arrow whizzed past his head, senses effacing as his will eroded under the barrage of casting. Above it all was Alexius’ voice and the abyssal truth of what they had lost. Cassandra was limp between the arms of two cultists.

            Their Herald was gone. The mark was gone. Taliah.

            He did this. He did this and their only key was gone.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *         

 

            “You enslave my people and expect me to just get along.”

            “Oh hardly, we can’t have that,” Dorian said with equal vigor. They were ankle deep in water, the red lyrium around them leaving a metallic, putrid taste in the mouth. “Though, perhaps we might argue such differences when we’ve escaped whatever future Void we ended up in?”

            “Can’t do both?”

            Dorian barked one laugh.

            There was a sound in the back of Lavellan’s throat. Her expression blanked as they plodded past another set of stairs, met with more Venatori that left them bloodied. The red lyrium was everywhere. It sang in her mark. Not singing, grating. A sickening pulse when they passed too close. It left her flexing fingers whenever they weren’t wrapped around a dagger.

            In a small cell surrounded by the blighted crystal, they found Cassandra praying. Her eyes radiated the same glow as the lyrium, the grating hum calling from her very skin. There was pain there too, and her face was drawn, faith clinging to what little humanity remained. In another cell deeper in the dungeon Lavellan found Solas, clinging to the corner of the dark, small space. He turned at the sound of their steps, and jerked back to the wall when he saw her. Like Cassandra, his eyes and sallow skin misted red like the crystals around them. The ache brought by seeing him wasn’t in the mark alone.

            Lavellan put a hand against the bars as he stared at her.

            The disbelief couldn’t be masked from his face. From his red, faceted eyes. “You’re alive! We saw you die…”

            “The spell Alexius cast displaced us in time. We only just got here, so to speak.”

            Solas swung his head between them, brow drawn tight as he watched, a jerking tremor in his limbs. His voice fractured between octaves, a peculiar resonance in his words. “Can you reverse the process?”

            “Possibly,” Dorian said.

            Lavellan struggled to find her tongue, only looking away as she dropped to a knee. From the flat pocket in the leather bracer round her wrist, she produced her picks and worked the lock. “I’m getting you out of here.”

            Solas met her against the bars, a rattle in his breath. “You could return and obviate the events of the last year. It may not be too late…”

            “I’m glad you understand each other. I’m still not sure what happened.” The lock clicked, and she jerked the door open to let him out. He walked with a twitch in his limbs.

            “You would think such understanding would prevent us from making such a terrible mistake. You would be wrong.”

            “You look … bad.” Lavellan put a hand on his shoulder, searching his face. “Is there anything I can do?”

            “I am dying, that much is clear.” Solas’ eyes drifted between them, meeting with Cassandra’s defeated grimace. He shook his head. “You know nothing of this world… it is far worse than you know. Alexius served a master, the Elder One. He reigns now unchallenged.”

            Words were lost from Lavellan’s lips. Red mist hovered around Solas’ neck, his motions jerky and foreign.

            “His minions assassinated Empress Celene and used the chaos to invade the south.” Solas met her gaze, his pupils and irises consumed by red. His voice fractured still, warped and crystalline. “This Elder One commands an army of demons. After you stop Alexius, you must be prepared!”

            “We will.” Lavellan exchanged glances with Dorian. “Are you able to help us?”

            “If there is any hope, any way to save them…” Solas looked at her, eyes unfocussed none the less. “My life is yours. This world is an abomination. It must never come to pass.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            They were bloodied by the time the lyrium pieces were embedded into the puzzle door, and ragged and weak when Alexius fell, the rift in the throne room stitched shut by Lavellan’s hand. The world was torn, and they could hear the army coming for them. It throbbed in the mark, sensitized her skin to the tips, a beat that magnified with pain and numbness as the Elder One grew closer.  

            “Thank the Maker,” Dorian said as he retrieved an amulet from Alexius’ broken body. He grimaced, looking upon his former patron, but his voice was moderated. “It’s the same amulet we had back home. I should be able to complete the spell within an hour.”

            “You have as long as we can stand,” Leliana replied. The castle shook again, warbled and spittle-ridden roars vibrating through the stone.

            Cassandra and Solas exchanged glances. His posture was hobbled, emaciated fingers gripping his staff, and she had a slick of blood down her neck that oozed with the aura of red lyrium. He met her eyes and nodded. “Inquisitor.”

            The throne room doors opened to let them out, green light spilling in from the foyer, where the ceiling had collapsed. It sent a pulse through her palm, the grating sensation distant to the exhaustion through her. The light eclipsed them, only broken by the familiar shimmer of Solas’ barrier. Leliana stood vigilant by the puzzle door, empty eyes watching as Dorian pulled through the Veil and the amulet sparked to life. The stone rumbled again, coupled with the shriek of fear and sloth, and the clap of lightning and steel.

            Lavellan pulled her daggers, ignoring the pain Dorian’s magic and the permeating wrongness that the world woke in the mark. Ignoring the fatigue and broken rib that shallowed her breath. Ignoring the glot of thoughts that said she would never see Solas again, or Varric’s jibes in camp. That the demon army was coming for them, was coming for her, and that the world had ended in her absence. Waiting for the end, and Creators have mercy, let them escape, let this never be.

            The amulet sparked at her side, Dorian’s focus unwavering in face of what came.

            The hairs on Lavellan’s neck rose as a barrage rocked the doors, but they held, and Leliana whipped her bow into arm in reply. The murmurs on the archer’s lips were lost in the shrieks that followed, and the next hit blew the doors open. Sickly green light spilled in and arrows flew, spiking Venatori and mages alike.

            Lavellan’s chest hollowed out as a demon tossed Solas’ body to the floor. The air hummed with arrows and tasted of decay, the mark in her hand branding pain past her shoulder. When an arrow hit Leliana, she moved but Dorian grabbed her arm.

            “You move, and we all die!”

            Disassociated from it all, Lavellan let Dorian tug her back to the magical spark, the vortex that called to its kin in her hand. Leliana’s bow snapped as she stabbed a Venatori, only to be grabbed by another, her head wrenched irreparably aside. The demons shrieked again, their eyes on them, the castle trembling and filled with light. It sung through their skin, and when the mists faded, the green was gone, leaving only innocent firelight and Alexus’ shocked face.

            Dorian scoffed behind her. “You’ll have to do better than that.”

            Lavellan’s eyes turned from the humbled magister to where Cassandra and Solas stood, unaware but obviously relieved. And alive.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

            The mages marched to Haven with a retinue of soldiers to guide them through the snowy passes, and at the stead was the Herald, her face a mask to the weighty core inside. Cassandra and Solas marched with them, but fell silent as their questions were answered short and curt.

            “I’ll write a report for everyone, isn’t that what you want?” Lavellan said, her voice low to keep others from hearing.

            “We must press the advantage, Herald. We must use everything we can,” Cassandra said.

            Solas thought the haunted look in her eyes was too familiar.

            It was still dark when Lavellan left a scroll on the war table. She sat on the wall around the small village, a spool of green wool in her lap and looped over a crochet hook. The hook had come with her all this way, tucked into her armour and hidden like a blade. It was idle fancy that she bought the spool when they were in Redcliffe the other day but now…

            The sun was coming up, spilling light into the world, challenging the ever-present whorl of the Breach. She pulled a cloak tighter around her frame, pushing the thoughts of the future from her mind, listening instead to the camps wake and begin to move.

            But what she had seen in Redcliffe was not so easily dismissed, the memory of the grating pain and warped world roused a tension in her chest. The Elder One was out there, gathering strength to craft that future. Even if she lived, how could they possibly stop it? She exhaled hard and flexed her hands, before taking up the hook again.             Lavellan’s hands looped and hooked, knotting and slipping the chain together in a rhythm she had sorely missed. Like so many moments in her life, it brought clarity to her thoughts, to her feelings, and drained some of the tension from the back of her neck.

            “Have you been up here all night?”

            Lavellan cast a sideways glance, her hands still chaining the wool yarn. “Not all night.”

            “Quite the debate goes on in the Chantry,” Solas said, shifting his weight from foot to foot. “It sounds as though you were granted a rare gift.”

            “Just the sort of thing I hoped for,” she murmured. Cold hands crocheted in a swaying cadence. The square was more than two feet long. “You can join me, you know.”  
            Solas shifted his weight again, before tucking his coat under to sit down within arm’s reach of her. He watched her hands, before looking at the Breach. “You have been shown the cost of your failure. That is a chance no one else has.”

            Lavellan let the hook rest in her lap, following his gaze. In the Breach she could see the floating edifices of Redcliffe castle, see Leiliana’s emaciated features, and most of all, the glow of red lyrium in _his_ eyes. When she looked now though, the blue she saw instead was small comfort. “Do you remember it?”

            “As I said yesterday, no. The person I am in the future is not here.”

            “Hopefully they never will be.” Tension rose up her arms, threatening to knot her neck and wanting to make her run off through the trees. Wanting some body and lips and hands to make her forget what would come. She glanced at Solas, and shook her head at herself, picking up her hook again. “You… sacrificed yourself so Dorian could cast his spell to bring us back. You went against the demons to save us. The red lyrium was everywhere… it poisoned you. You died before my eyes in demon’s clutches. I saw your body.”

            “That may be… but you learned a great deal. That insight on our enemy’s next move, it is invaluable.”

            Lavellen nodded and let out a slow sigh, the looping chain moving back to its normal pace. The sky crackled around the Breach, some perverse aurora.

            “Would you give it back if you could?”

            “No,” Lavellan said, and looked at him again. Her gaze lingered until he looked at her too. “The Breach, that was a grave threat but… will closing it be enough? Don’t get me wrong, I see the value in what happened in Redcliffe… you’re right.”

            Eyebrows moving with his words, Solas grinned. “I often am.”

            Lavellan grinned briefly, still crocheting as she said, “So cheeky.”

            “I wouldn’t have imagined you sitting here crocheting.”  
            She kept her eyes down. “Keeper taught me when I was a girl, she said, da’len if you cannot be fruitful with your mind, be so with your hands. Well, before that it was, if you cannot behave properly, you cannot do what you want. And so she made me crochet. To calm me down. To slow me.”

            Solas leant closer as he said, “You were a willful child.”

            “That’s putting it mildly.”

            “Little has changed.”

            Lavellan smirked as she watched him, her hands still moving. “Would passive fit better – no, obedient perhaps?”

            Solas rolled his tongue, lips pursed in a thoughtful grin. His voice dropped lower. “An interesting prospect, but no.”

            “Really,” Lavellan laughed and looked down at the length of stitched fabric. “It seems like something you would know how to do. You make your own clothing.”

            “In recent years, yes. Though, I can’t tell if that’s meant to be a compliment or otherwise.”

            “It’s familiar. I like that.”

            Solas’ smile softened.

.           Lavellan watched him as he looked over the mountains, a peculiar relief spreading through her gut at seeing his eyes clear and bright, and his posture straight and proper; at not feeling the warped, sickened tug of the corrupted crystals festering in him. There was only the natural aura his magic brought, a subtle pressure in her palm stronger than most other mages.

            She poked him in the side, and he twitched. When he cleared his throat, she narrowed her eyes and a devilish grin spread. When she made to poke him again, he batted her hand away and turned his eyes on her, prompting her to tilt her head. She relinquished her crocheting as she said, “I’m thankful that future is gone. I would have never tickled you again.”

            “I am not. I assure you.”

            “Of course not,” she laughed, and grinned as he shook his head. “My mistake.”

 


	8. Keeper's Handwriting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the Herald of Andraste makes even a Dalish elf the target of many. And those they care for.

            Cullen was waiting near the gates with a clutch of missives when they rode into Haven, glad to be off the long road back from investigating the shards and the Solasan temple in the western oasis. Taliah Lavellan wanted nothing more than to wander off into the trees, to skirt around the frozen lake. And to sleep for at least a day. The ride was long and hard, they had been gone from the town for too long. Raven’s brought word that the mages were ready to attempt the Breach, and they had scarce stopped on the return trip.

            “Herald.” The General shifted his weight from foot to foot, lips drawn down.

            Lavellan wrinkled her nose and dismounted. Cassandra took their chargers, and the elf shook the feeling back into her legs. “The world falls apart in our absence -- ah wait, that already happened, so how bad can it be?”

            He didn’t smile.

            Lavellan extended a hand, and he laid a rolled parchment in her palm. Solas and Dorian walked past and up the steps towards the town gate.

            “We received word from your clan.”

            “Lovely that you read it,” Lavellan said, but her lips fell shut as she look at Keeper’s tight, efficient script on the page. It was a punch in the gut. There were annotations from both Leliana and Cullen in the spare space at the bottom. “When did this come?”

            “One of Leliana’s runners arrived at dawn. I think she scarce rested, the poor girl rode straight from the sea.”

            “And what’s being done?” Lavellan said as she swept up the stairs, near-running strides that forced Cullen to double-step to keep up. “Or could you not make any decision without me?”  
            “We expected your return. If it had been any longer, I would have mobilized troops.”

            “No,” Lavellan said, and looked at the letter again. Fine lines of distress formed around her eyes and brow. “Soldiers won’t do. The last thing I want is a shem army storming in!”

            “I… yes…” Cullen said, abashed. “Of course. Excuse my ignorance.”

            Lavellan swept under the eaves of Leliana’s tent. A tremor ran through her, and she clenched the parchment until it crackled and almost tore. “Send your agents. Immediately. Please.”

            Leliana dismissed the young man she spoke with and turned in close to the Herald. “It is done.  We will do all we can to protect you family.”

            “Right. Thank you.” Lavlelan’s eyes were on Keeper’s cursive again. The only times in recent memory she had seen it were coupled with change, and it was a reminder of how far away she was from them. For how itchy her feet had always been, the homesick nausea and ache washed over her with little regard for anything else.

            Cullen lingered, blocking the daylight at the tent’s opening. “There are other matters that require our attention.”

            The missive dragged Lavellan’s arm down her side, and she made to clear the emotion from her throat.

            “It was a hard ride. Let us meet after the evening meal, I am certain Cassandra appreciates the time to catch up on the information that’s arrived in her absence,” Leliana said.

            “I’ll be there,” Lavellan said, lifting her head, expression blank. She forced a smile before she turned away. Beyond the campfire, her feet carried her straight past Solas and the quartermaster, down the steps and back out the gate.

            If she were a proper hunter, she would have been there to protect them. She would have found the camps, they would have done away with the bandit threat. They would have moved. She would have made a difference. She wouldn’t be relying on others to do her job for her people.

            She was past the stables before she stopped herself, the Breach a distraction from her thoughts. Then she could feel the walls of the town, hear the clash of recruits in training, and all the shemlen that surrounded her; all the humans that she was supposed to have some connection to. There were no familiar statues or shapes, the wind was biting and dry, and her hands cracked from the cold. Her feet carried her away from them, until the only sounds were the wind and the broken sky.

            Lavellan looked at the letter again, at Keeper’s writing, and she could almost hear her voice. She closed her eyes, so that it was just her and the wind on her skin. For a moment she could imagine it was winter in the Marches. Her head lay in her mother’s lap, a fever on her skin, and it was Keeper’s even voice and knowledge of the arcane that helped her through when mamae went to hunt, when she was heartbroken and weary. A quill in hand and Keeper’s reassurance as she tried to read and form the words. The last memories of her clan, they didn’t know where she went or what she did, only that she would be gone. Memories that blurred from time, from the liquor they’d drunk, and the headaches that followed her on the road.

            “You left them in quite the panic.”

            Her head snapped around, a hand going for her dagger. She saw Solas and huffed out. “And that proves my salt as a hunter. You keep doing that.”

            “Hardly a slight against you, more a reflection of my own abilities.”

            “How kind of you to say,” she said with a smirk, but it soon faded. The parchment pressed to her chest. “What can I do for you, Solas? Or did they send you after me.”

            “They hold no sway over my actions,” he said. “I overheard that your clan is under duress.”

            “Yes. Because of me,” she said, and her face tightened. “It doesn’t feel right being here while they aren’t safe.”

            Solas stepped up to her side, bearing the wind alongside her with his hands behind his back. He nodded towards the Breach, ever present in the sky. “Bandits or no, few in the world are safe at this time.”

            “Ohhh, I know,” Lavellan said with a sigh. She glanced at Keeper’s cursive once more, before carefully folding it and tucking it into a hidden pocket in her coat. “It just feels like I am helping anyone I can, except the people I care for the most.”

            Solas’ voice was just above the volume of the wind. “Sometimes that is the cost to save the world.”

            “That’s reassuring.”

            “I am sorry…”

            “Don’t be.” Lavellan turned a sad smile to him. “It’s true. I’d rather honesty than some platitude.”

            “I hope for the best. What would it say of the Inquisition if it cannot protect its Herald’s own?”

            Lavellan sighed and crossed her arms, looking back out over the lake but offering no response.

            “No doubt they miss you a great deal.”

            “As long as they’re safe. Missing me won’t protect them.” There was a tension in her chest that laced through her shoulders, and Lavellan swallowed thickly. “Who is missing you while you’re helping save the world?”

            “There are few who remember me as I am,” he said, the words clipped, and it made her turn to him. His eyes were over the lake now. “Memories distort what truly happened.”

            “So many sides to every moment, isn’t that what you said?”

            Solas hummed a bit and nodded. Lavellan tucked her hands into her coat, crunching in the snow to stand with him shoulder-to-shoulder into the wind. It sucked out all the heat, the high sun offering no warmth in the frigid landscape. But the cold sobered and cleansed, it brought clarity and evaporated her tension.

            Lavellan’s toes were numb when she sniffed in and said, “Will you come with us to the Breach? I want you to lead the mages. There’s no one else I trust to do it.”

            “I doubt there is anyone else who could.”

            She smirked and glanced at him. His nose and cheeks were reddened from the wind, lips paled. He met her gaze as she spoke. “Let’s go somewhere warm and you can walk me through it. I might as well get a drink, in case it kills me tomorrow.”

            “I do not believe that will come to pass.”

            Lavellan inhaled sharply and laughed dryly. “I hope you’re right. I really do.”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *                     

 

            “Channel your will through the Herald!”

            The sudden rush of energy through Lavellan’s limbs burst in her palm, sparkling across her skin as the mark surged to life with voracious need. For a moment, the numbing pain of her proximity to the Breach vanished, and she was able to lift her hand. The energy from the mages flowed, and when the connecting tie of magical light joined her hand to the sky, it set every nerve alight. She grit her teeth, muscles shaking as she stepped closer, struggling to raise her hand higher as it coursed through her.

            The world lost focus and muted, pulled into a riptide of magic, and the voices and crackling sounds were gone. There was only the feel of the Breach in her palm, in every limb, alight and burning on her lips. There was no air, just the pain and the undeniable pull of the tear in the sky. It pulsed in her hand, nerves, sight, taste, drawn into the sky, spun and lost in the whorl of magical energy.

            In her fingertips, Lavellan felt the edges of the gaping Breach. They weren’t rough and responsive like the rifts, no, this was punched clean through, familiar pain that called through the mark. The strain in her chest grew, desperate for air, but she didn’t matter right now. Not her body, not the ground that felt so distant. Just the pulse and pull, her fingers splayed wide to snag on the edges of the Veil and slam it closed with the last of her strength.

            The moment it closed, the pain released her, and she staggered, only to be flattened by the shockwave that descended from the sky. The tide was receding, the water gone from her lungs and the buzzing, numbing pain… was nearly gone. Lavellan trembled at the soundless laugh that shook her where she lay on the ground, staring at the warped clouds in the sky where the Breach had been. She became aware of Cassandra’s voice as she rolled onto all fours. The mark still sparked, sputtering to find stability, and the fatigue washed through her.

            Helped to her feet though, Lavellan couldn’t help but smile and join the rest in looking at the sky. It was closed. It was really closed.


	9. In Your Heart Shall Burn

            “It was the best choice.”

            Commander Cullen glanced at Leliana from where he stood at the start of the tangled mountain pass. The wind was picking up, but he could see the fires below. Haven burned, the snow melted away to leave brown and black destruction. The fires encircled the last trebuchet, and from their safe vantage they could see it all. Could see the dragon land for the bait. Could see the Herald in the hand of the Elder One. “I convinced her to stay and buy us time.”

            “And you of all people can appreciate that sacrifice.”

            “Maker guide her,” he whispered. The last of the villagers were coming into the pass, carrying all they could and driving what beasts of burden survived.

            There was a burst of light that flared in his gut, and in its place Solas, Cassandra, and Blackwall appeared, staggering in the snow and panting for breath.

            “Send the signal,” Leliana said. Beside him, a fireball erupted from Dorian’s staff and shot high overhead, trailing smoke in its wake and casting a ghastly red glow.

            “We abandoned her,” Blackwall said, stilted steps carrying him forward.

            “It was her choice. She saved the Inquisition. Saved us all.” Cullen’s voice cracked. “We must believe she can save herself too.”

            The wind whipped up the slopes of the mountain, funneled by the juts of rock that marked the path. Already the survivors marched on, led by Mother Giselle and the spirit Cole, fording through the snow. Solas’ eyes turned with Cullen’s, the world slowing as the pouch of the trebuchet swung to let the payload fly. The dragon’s cry reached them even there, shivering over the slopes and clutching the heart. The boulder hit high above the treeline, smacking into snow with a clap that rivalled thunder, summoning it, the deep rolling rumble shaking the ground and pluming snow.

            “Maker’s mercy,” Cullen whispered. “Protect and guide her back to us.”

            “Maker, hear our prayer,” Varric murmured.

            Solas was silenced by the glut of tension in his chest. It robbed the warmth from his limbs more than the wind. The dragon was airborne, a passenger in its clutches. The snow swallowed the chantry, the battlements, and the trebuchet, and the clouds from doused fires obscured their view. The last made it through the pass, and Dorian, Cullen, and even Varric turned their eyes from the billowing snow, from the wind that bit their cheeks, from the smell of ash, bodies, and tar. Solas exhaled and shivered, before falling into line at the rear.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

 

_Varric took Lavellan’s hands and pulled her into the dance around the fire, pressing a skein of wine into her free palm. The villagers were singing and laughing, the town was filled with their sound and the sky was calm. She took a deep swig of the wine, and they clapped, hands waving and some urging her to join them in song. But she shook her head, and feet moving as she tried to follow their steps. It only brought more laughter, and she joined too, drinking down the skein. Another song began, and the villagers and soldiers stamped feet in time. Lavellan escaped as they urged her again, unwilling to dampen their spirits by admitting she didn’t know any of the songs._

            She could taste dried blood on her lips.

_“No, no, no!”Lavellan cried as she dropped the soldier and lurched back towards the burning building. But the flames were too high and too hot, stealing her breath and singing the hairs on hands. She might have burst into the house but for Solas grabbing her arm._

_“You’ll never make it.”_

_“My mother’s bow, it’s all I have,” she said, the words clutching her heart.  No, it was an arrow breaking through the maille. She pulled it out, spittle on her lips as she looked at the house again. She turned on the red templars with daggers bared, guarding Solas at her flank as she screamed and darted to bring their deaths._

            The thrum of her pulse was in her ears, in her finger tips, and it muted every ache. It chased away the cold ground beneath her.

            _“Get out of here.”_

_“What? You can’t expec-“_

_Lavellan cut Cassandra off, snapping towards them with a step. “I said go! Now!”_

_Solas met her eyes, his mouth in a grim line as he backpedaled and snagged Blackwall’s arm._

_“Maker protect you, Taliah,” Cassandra said, before turning to join them in the run towards the chantry._

_It left her alone in the ruins of their encampment, the burning walls, and the sound of the encroaching army. It was soon drowned by the roar of the dragon bearing down. They were gone. She couldn’t know if they’d make it, but soon enough all thoughts of her demise were blown away by the flap of the dragon’s wings, and she cowed to the ground, unrelenting._

            A shiver wracked her body, and she blinked wide but saw nothing in the dark. Even it slipped away again.

_“You are a mistake.”_

_The mark in her hand lit with a familiar pain, deeper now, grating to the very bone. It was the taste, the feeling of the future in Redcliffe. She hung limp in the arm of the Elder One, dwarfed twice over by its size. Lavellan kicked and flailed, only to be flung into the last sturdy trebuchet, crumpling as it spoke again._

_“The Anchor is permanent.”_

_There was blood on her lips, seeping beneath her clothes, and her left arm hung limp at her side, the anchor still flickering. She flailed and grabbed a sword, hoisting it with what little strength remained. There was fire all around, but her eyes were still good; a bright flare sailed high in the mountains, and it brought with it fear, nausea, and a sparking rush through her limbs._

_They would be safe._

A full body shiver brought her back, breath sputtering in the cold air, sputtering blood, and Lavellan rolled, cradling her left arm to her. The other hand smacked ice. When the anchor sparked, she inhaled back to consciousness, the sound echoing off the dark walls. The rock and ice was green lit, and when she tried to move it sent a lance of pain up her back and arm. She choked on her bloody spit again, clawing to her hands and knees. The mark crackled in protest, sending broken light dancing across the ice.

            At least she was alive. Maybe she was.

            She grit her teeth and hissed, pulling to her feet with a deep cry as bruising, no, broken bones made their case. She closed her eyes and steadied her legs, waiting to see if she would black out again, panted breaths echoing off the tunnel. Dizziness rolled through her but she didn’t collapse.

            Overhead, the path of her fall was blocked tight with snow, but ahead there was a frozen stream, rocks held fast within the black ice. She stumble-stepped down the tunnel, each footfall bringing a pulse of pain and magnifying the throb behind her eyes. Dried blood cracked on her cheeks and lips. There were no potions in her satchel, but she scrounged a pair of elfroot leaves and stuffed them into her mouth. It did little to dull the stabs of pain. The mark crackled again, flaring bright green and lighting the way. The Elder One called it the Anchor. Her fingers hung limp and open as she dragged forward.

            When the demons appeared, her reaction seemed precognitive, and a fade rift burst to life before her eyes. Lavellan cried out, scarce able to stand, and stumbled to right herself against the frozen ice walls. The demons could not reach her, and she saw how the rift pulled at them. The rift she had created, the tug it offered familiar but without pain. It ate away at their being and they evaporated into its core, torn back across the Veil. Hope flushed through her, the strength driving her limbs forward towards the dimming light, where she could hear the wind howl.

            If nothing else, Solas had to see what she could do now.

            Emerging from the shelter of the tunnel, Lavellan tried to gain her bearings, the world torn by wind and snow, the sky black and starless, and the air filled with the howling storm. There was snow as far as she could see, but… the depression of the lake! Shuddering heavily, she looked for the familiar outline of the mountains, their shadow scarce visible through the bluster. Tucking her head down, she trudged up the shores of the lake and across the snow-effaced landscape.

            The warmth was gone, her armour thin and cold-pressed in frozen blood against her skin. No, there was no cold against her, she was nothing but it. The wind passed through it all, the snow and ice pellets forcing her to squint with each glance ahead. Had she been human or qunari, her feet might have sunk deeper through the wind-hardened crust on the snow.  They dragged through the new-fallen snow atop it, and her teeth chattered unbidden, hands tucked into her armpits. Numbed, burning ears and cheeks were aggravated by the wind, the ache robbing her of sensation in the same moment.

            The only feeling left behind was deep in her core. Thinking of hunting with her clan, of snow fights in sunny glades, of mulled wine around campfires and blankets shared. Another campfire, there was a dwarf and an elf who might have warmed her cheeks, his murmur in her thoughts. She could only hope they made it to the pass, they made it beyond the snow, that they escaped the Elder One. Escaped from the cold grave for which she was bound alongside so many.

            There was howling in the night, second string to the wind. Howling on her heels to remind her of the meal she would be if she let her legs stop.

            Lavellan’s breaths came short and shallow to keep the cold from her lungs, to keep from coughing and reviving the pain in her ribs. Her lethargic steps were drowned by the storm as she ascended higher through the mountains, tracing in vain to where the signal flare had flown. Her heart palpitated, hard but slowing, limbs numb but moving on and on. She knew if she stopped she would die. She would lie down and be covered, the world would darken and there would be warmth and nothing more.

            The tingling burn and stinging blades of the wind were fading. It might come soon without her collapse.

            She stumbled on another campsite, whose glowing embers offered a warmth so painful she couldn’t near it. Useless hands. On through the snow, but now she saw the darkened peaks overhead, the blinding gale swept away by their jealous presence.

            They were gone. And she would be too.

            Numb, brick feet and limbs dragged through the snow. The cold was jealous, wanting her for its own. Wanting to take her away from this. The clatter in her teeth was gone, just like the shivers, it fled because they knew her end was coming. The wind left only a muted hush.

            When Lavellan collapsed in the snow, she could hear Cullen and Cassandra calling. Just one last ghost in her thoughts, spat out as the snow rose to claim her. The dark mountains were closing in, the cold permeating every inch, bleary eyes and lashes clung with ice. There were hands, familiar hushed words, and her name, they called the Herald, whispering kindness and praise. The weight of the world, the way the wind blew through her disappeared.

            Words would not find her lips, nor feeling in her hands, but it all moved, she moved with it, and them.

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

           

            Warmth flushed through her limbs, and she could hear Solas’ voice close, indecipherable words that carried the haste of concern; further was Mother Giselle’s lilting accent and the hard edge of Cassandra and Cullen’s worried murmurs. Lavellan’s head rolled, neck and shoulders aching but limp beneath the weight of wool. In a brief, bleary moment she saw Solas’ face, brow furrowed and lips in a hard line. The warmth seemed to give her permission to let go, and the knot unfurled, weakened, numb limbs heavy with relief, and finally the oblivion of sleep.


End file.
